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Soccer Picks for Schalke vs. Mainz

Friday night gives your Humble Handicapper
and your good selves a change to start the weekend with a wodge in your pocket
thanks to this little money spinner over in Germany’s top flight. Schalke take
on Mainz, in a game sure to have value soccer picks in it.

Schalke are on a mini-role at present and
took Bayer Leverkusen down a peg, 2-1 thanks to Huntelaar’s late winner who
scored with 12 minutes remaining to seal the win. Schalke went ahead through
Leon Goretzka's first half strike, but Leverkusen equalised from Felipe
Santana's own goal just past the hour. Then the late goal from Huntelaar saw
Jens Keller's side take all the points. This means that Schalke are on a four
game winning run at time of press. Mainz have also won four of their last five,
but were beaten just two games ago (3-1 away to Wolfsburg).

Enough with past matches…WHERE’S THE MONEY
MIKE?

This is what the bookies think about each
sides chances of winning. Schalke are
the favourites at 4/6 while Mainz are very much the under dogs at 4/1, and a
draw is at 14/5. Possible upset alert! We haven’t seen a home victory in
clashes between these two sides since Sep 2012 when Schalke beat Mainz 1-0, but
the bookies seem to think we’ll see one this time.

The meetings between these sides seem to be
close run affairs we’ve had two draws in the last five and whenever we’ve seen
a clear winner, it's been by a 1 goal margin (twice (2-1 and 1-0)). The only one that sticks out like a sore
thumb is a 3-0 home win to Schalke back in September 2012; a repeat of that
score is offered up at best soccer odds of 14/1. But I don’t think that’s
likely.

What makes more sense is to back the game
being won by a single goal at 11/10, but that is pretty tight odds. It’s hardly
better looking at Schalke to win by a single goal at 11/4. But if you were just
after a safe bet you wouldn’t be reading this far down.

What does the table tell us?

Schalke are on a bit of a tear at the
minute running high up the table 4th in the league just two points behind Bayer
Leverkusen. They do have a four point cushion on the team behind them (Vfl
Wolfsburg) but a four point cushion isn’t a comfortable cushion. Mainz are down
in 7th place on 33 points.

Mainz have a goal difference of -4, having
scored 31 goals and conceding 35. After 21 games, that averages out to about
1.5 goals scored and conceded per game, as we can’t have ½ goals that gives us
less help, but it is useful to know that they tend to concede more than they
score. Schalke have scored 41 goals in 21 games that’s almost an average of 2
per game, and they conceded 30, again that’s about 1.5 per game.

Throw all that into the mental mix and add
on the fact that the bookies like Schalke winning both halves (at 7/5), drawing
on the 45, and then winning on the 90 (at7/2). The game being drawn on the 45
and the 90 (11/2) before they like Mainz winning (both halves at 15/2) shows us
who will be walking away with the points. We feel confident taking Schalke in our soccer picks.

Prediction: 2-1 to Schalke available at
best soccer odds of 8/1 with BetVictor.